Plastic articles, in particular plastic beverage bottles, for example of PET, are increasingly provided with plastic labels. When such plastic articles are recycled, these labels must be preferably completely removed, just as conventional paper labels. Otherwise, etchants that are employed, for example, in washing processes, will cause an undesired introduction of color into the respective washing medium and into the washed plastic.
The removal of the labels by means of wet processes, for example in washing of complete bottles, is not sufficiently effective in particular in case of plastic labels. By dry methods, for example by means of cutting tools, the labels can neither be reliably removed to the desired degree, so that time-consuming manual sorting of the articles is normally required before the latter are subsequently crushed. The sorted-out articles are then usually disposed of or can only be used for processes of inferior quality.
There is thus a problem in conventional methods and devices in that either a very high number of personnel must be employed for sorting the articles again to obtain a fraction for subsequent crushing that is sufficiently homogenous as to type and color, or in that the usually colored labels remain in the material to be crushed in such a high amount that an undesired coloration of the recycled material cannot be avoided. This is particularly disadvantageous in case of clear plastics, in particular with clear PET for the packaging of food. It is moreover desirable to optimize the efficiency of the recycling of labeled articles.
There is thus a demand for methods and devices for recycling plastic articles, in particular widely used PET beverage bottles, which methods and devices are improved in this respect.